


things we couldn't kill

by technorat



Category: Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Canon-Typical Violence, Force Ghost(s), Force-Sensitive Armitage Hux, M/M, Major Character Undeath, Minor Character Death, Post-Star Wars: The Last Jedi, Temporary Character Death
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-11
Updated: 2019-11-11
Packaged: 2021-02-01 04:44:08
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 15,012
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21382558
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/technorat/pseuds/technorat
Summary: Supreme Leader Ren and General Hux have come to a shaky peace and have truly become an effective team. Or, at least, until Hux betrayed Ren one final time.Or, Ren is haunted by the ghost of Hux. Not everything is what it seems.
Relationships: Armitage Hux/Ben Solo | Kylo Ren, Armitage Hux/Kylo Ren
Comments: 34
Kudos: 355
Collections: Kylux Big Bang 2019





	things we couldn't kill

**Author's Note:**

> Plenty of warnings for this fic!  
Warnings: Major character death, temporary character death, minor character deaths, canon-typical violence.  
The major character death occurs in the very first section.
> 
> My partner for the Kylux Big Bang was the wonderful niibeth! You can you can find her [here](http://niibeth.tumblr.com) on tumblr and you can find her [here](https://twitter.com/Kortesku) on twitter. I will add the links to the art here later!
> 
> A very special thank you to my beta! You can find them [here](https://steampoweredwitch.tumblr.com) on tumblr
> 
> you can find me [here](http://gaygalaxyguy.tumblr.com) on tumblr and you can find me [here](https://twitter.com/gay_galaxy_guy) on twitter.

"Sir," says a panicked looking officer, cheek bruised. "There's a situation."

”What," Ren grinds out, "do you mean by a situation?"

He's led down to one of the conference rooms, a squadron of Stormtroopers behind him. Ren opens the door and lights his saber.

The first thing that hits him is the stench of blood and burned flesh.

The second thing that hits him is Hux.

"For the Supreme Leader!" yells out an officer, charging, blaster first, at a disheveled, bleeding Hux.

Hux shoots her dead and turns, eyes wide and so afraid, to shoot at Ren.

Ren stops the bolt inches away from his face.

Hux does not drop his blaster. Most officers are dead or dying. There are a few that are wounded less, but shiver and shake on the ground. Hux's expression hardens, and his finger pulls the trigger again.

Ren deflects the bolt, sending it screaming into a wall.

Hux is the last one standing, panting harshly. "_Ren_\--"

He doesn't let Hux finish speaking, cannot let Hux finish speaking. Not after this betrayal, not after this _mutiny. _

Ren flings the blaster out of Hux's hands and tackles him to the ground. Hux is hot beneath him, like a fever is raging through his body. Ren fits his hands around Hux's neck, feeling the wild heartbeat below.

Hux stabs him with his monomolecular knife, sticking it right in Ren's thigh. He pulls his arm back, meaning to stab him _again_, but Ren stops him, weighing down Hux's arm with his knee.

"You betray your Supreme Leader?" Ren hisses above him, gnashing his teeth together.

Hux gurgles, his dripping saliva tinged red. His hand comes to claw against Ren's own, useless, useless, always useless.

"How could you?" Ren demands. As if they had not found an uneasy peace, as if Hux was not his most trusted advisor, as if they could not have conquered the Galaxy together.

Hux struggles and struggles until suddenly he does not, limp and so very pale.

His blue green grey eyes have clouded over.

From atop him, Ren lets out a wail.

*

_It was a few days after Crait that he had realized that if he wanted this to work, he would need Hux loyal and at his side._

_They had patched one another's wounds as they talked within the safety of Hux's room. The ice blue couch was plush and soft beneath him. Hux covered himself in a silk robe, one that fell only to mid-thigh, but did not feel conscious in the slightest about it._

_They talked well into the late cycle and fell asleep right there, on the couch, leaning against one another._

*

Ren carries on, as if Hux's betrayal had never happened, as if everything is perfectly normal, as if all is well.

He is nearly buried in work, doing what Hux had once done.

He eats less, sleeps less.

And then Ren begins to see things.

A flash of ginger hair. But when he blinks, there is nothing.

The fluttering of the General's greatcoat sleeve, and yet when he looks again, the coat belongs to a much lower ranked man.

Sometimes, he thinks he can hear Hux. He cannot make out specific words, but he would recognize the sharp way Hux shaped his words anywhere.

Ren meditates more, secluding himself from the other onboard his ship outside of the shifts he assigns himself.

It's work, work, work, followed by hours of meditation. Few dare bother him when he locks himself in his chambers.

But not tonight, apparently.

Someone requests entrance.

Ren looks up sharply, from the floor, and glares at his door. There is no one aboard the _Finalizer_ or any other ship that has an override code. Not anymore.

Someone requests entrance again, apparently unable to take a hint.

Ren clambers up, his joints stiff and cold. "This better be an emergency," he growls out, before opening the door with a wave.

Mitaka stands there, pale and quivering, a tray of food held in his clenched hands. "Supreme Leader, sir," he greets, lowering his head in deference. The food smells divine: a spicy stew and a fresh loaf of bread, accompanied with a small plate of roasted vegetables.

Ren bares all of his teeth and knocks the tray out of Mitaka's hands. It falls to the ground in a clatter.

"Really?" Ren snarls. "How stupid do you think I am?"

Mitaka looks up, his mouth open, pale as a sheet of paper. "S-sir," he manages weakly, around the Force choke.

But Mitaka was one of Hux's closest lieutenants. And Hux had betrayed him, tried to kill him _again_.

And now Hux was dead.

"Sir, you need to eat," Mitaka struggles. He falls to his knees, face an alarming shade of red.

Ren lets go. "Why? So that you may poison me? So that you may enact some final revenge of Hux?"

Mitaka shakes his head. His hat's gone askew. "Sir, that's not it at all!" he yelps. Grief swells and crests from him. Above all things, he had looked up to Hux. Hux's loss was terrible for the First Order, terrible for Mitaka.

Ren gnashes his teeth together. "Then what is it?" he demands.

"W-we are going through tumultuous times," Mitaka says. Because Hux is dead. Because Ren had _killed him_. Because, once again, everyone is afraid of him, cannot trust him. "The Order needs to feel reassured b-by the presence of its leader."

And, when he speaks, never once does Mitaka meet his eyes. He looks just past Ren, somewhere behind his ear.

"Why," Ren says, "does the First Order need to be reassured? All that happened was that a traitor was weeded out."

Mitaka flinches, a wave of hurt, anxiety, sorrow spilling from him.

"Would you care to join him?" Ren asks. "If you admired him so." He places a hand around Mitaka's throat and lifts him clear off the ground.

Mitaka gasps and struggles to speak around the hold. He quickly stops, growing red, then purple.

Hux is there, all at once. Pale and sneering, his lip split, his neck purple.

Ren lets go and sends Mitaka sprawling to the ground. He looks around for where Hux might have gone in the moment. He doesn't see him. Ren's heart beats loudly, as if it is trying to claw its way out of his chest.

He cannot sense Hux, cannot feel him.

But he had seen Hux.

He knows this.

Mitaka doesn't dare get up from where he had landed. Now, in addition to all the feelings from before, he radiates pain, coming from his knees and his wrist. He doesn't even look up, weeping soundlessly.

"You're dismissed," Ren says, waving him off.

He needs to find Hux, needs to throttle Hux, needs to _know _why his General would betray him _now_.

The door slides shut quickly. Ren kicks the mess that Mitaka had created, tray clattering when it hits a wall. He summons his datapad and requests a cleaning droid to put everything in order.

"Where are you, Hux?" Ren spits out.

He receives no answer. Predictable.

Ren smirks and pulls up the footage from within his rooms and winds it back a few minutes. He watches the whole altercation with Mitaka.

Not once does he see Hux.

Ren drops his datapad. The screen shatters.

*

_“What do you think will happen when you die?” Hux had asked once, when they were both drunk out of their minds following a banquet. He had flopped across his couch, spineless. His hair was a mess._

_Ren sat beside him, moving Hux’s legs so that they would rest across his lap._

_“Are you planning on trying to kill me again?” Ren asked lowly, voice rumbling._

_Hux shuddered, his whole face flushed. “Never,” Hux had promised. His hands had been hot and sweaty when they cupped Ren’s face. There were so many little scars engraved against Hux’s palms. They were rough against Ren’s cheeks. “I swore allegiance to you, didn’t I?”_

_Ren laughed._

What changed?

*

Ren wakes a minute before his alarm is set to go off. He rubs the sleep from his eyes and treks to the bathroom, the floor cold against his bare feet. He splashes water against his face, cold, ice cold, so as to wake him up.

The hair on the back of his neck stands up.

When he pulls down his hands, he sees _Hux_ behind him, reflected in the mirror’s surface. Hux is grim and pale, lips set in a fine line. Bruises litter his exposed throat, his face. Blood creeps down from his hairline. Blood vessels have burst in his eyes. His coat merges with the rest of his body, wisping away like fine smoke. He clutches a monomolecular knife in his bare hand.

Ren turns around, ready to throttle Hux all over again, his grief forgotten.

But no one else is there.

Hux is _dead._

Ren _killed_ him.

He would do to remember this.

But he cannot shake his racing heart. Cannot bring order to his rapid breathing.

Ren runs his fingers through his hair, tearing through the tangles.

*

Ren reports to the bridge only a few minutes late. Captain Peavey looks a little sour when he sees Ren, just exuding distaste. Ren preens, lifting his chin higher.

They would learn soon that Hux did not matter to the Order. That none of them did.

Everyone is replaceable. Another cog in the system.

He listens to report after report. All of the lieutenants that deliver him datapads of information are frightened, quivering with their fear. Their thoughts are disorganized things. Bits and pieces come to him.

_What will we do now?_

_—killed Hux._

_…conspiracies. There’s too many conspiracies._

And, strangely, from Peavey: _It could have gone so much better._

Ren frowns and barks orders. They still have not located the Resistance, though they’ve quelled rebellions that sprung up on other worlds. They couldn’t dawdle, couldn’t allow one moment to be wasted.

Cold seeps into him like nothing else.

Ren turns around and sees Hux walking along the railings, unafraid of falling down, down below.

“Peavey, you have the bridge,” Ren all but growls before setting off to confront the other man.

Hux does not move, but simply lingers. His hair is like a beacon, the light of Starkiller, a crown of fire. He sneers down at Ren.

It hits him only then that Hux is really dead.

That Hux is a ghost, haunting him.

“Why are you here?” Ren asks.

Hux bares all of his teeth in a snarl. “_You killed me_,” Hux says. His voice is hoarse, barely above a whisper. It sends shudders down the length of Ren’s spine. “_What did you do with my body_?”

“Threw it out of an airlock,” Ren snarls.

Hux’s face twists, anger, disbelief, and, behind it all, sorrow. “_You wouldn’t dare._”

“And why wouldn’t I?” Ren presses. “You are a traitor.”

Wisps of black and red float away from Hux in greater frequency. “_Me? A traitor?_” Hux barks laughter. “_You’re the one who ruined everything!_”

Ren bares all of his teeth. When he reaches out, his hand goes right through Hux. “Go back to wherever you came from,” he says. And, surprisingly, Hux does.

Ren laughs, bitter and helpless, and stares at his gloved hands.

When he returns to the bridge, no one remarks on his outbursts, but they are all thinking about it. And perhaps that is the worst part of it. Ren’s outbursts were nothing too unexpected.

*

In his dream, he is on Starkiller again. His face burns with the wound the Scavenger inflicted and the cold. His side aches. He presses on, through the snow, pushing through the howling wind, past the shivering trees.

Hux is there, dressed as if prepared to give another speech. His hat is affixed firmly to his head.

“Really?” Ren says.

“Really,” Hux repeats, mocking. Blood drips from him in rivulets, turning black and corrosive once the drops hit the snow.

“Why are you here?” Ren asks.

When Hux laughs, blood and spittle fly from his mouth, landing on Ren’s tunic. “Why shouldn’t I haunt you? You killed me, Supreme Leader.” His words are venom.

“I wouldn’t have killed you if you… if you—” Ren gestures wildly, relishing in Hux’s flinch.

“I didn’t betray you, Ren,” Hux insists. “You betrayed _me_. Accept it and repent with your life.”

Ren holds out a hand, pressing it again Hux’s burning forehead, and _pushes_—forcing Hux out of his dreams.

When Hux is gone, Starkiller falls apart under his feet.

No one is there to rescue him and so he falls and falls and falls.

*

Ren wakes up in a pool of his own sweat. He rises on shaky legs. If he closed his eyes, he would still feel as though he was falling endlessly through the void.

He takes a quick sonic, refusing to shut his eyes.

So far, banishing Hux worked, but not for long, not forever.

There was the question of _where exactly _Hux might go when he was not harassing him. And there was the question of _why_ a Force-null of all people returned as a ghost.

Cycles go by.

Hux’s will to torment him stays strong.

He appears in halls, in lifts, in mirrors and windows. In a memorable incident, Hux had appeared in Ren’s TIE fighter, had draped his form across the controls, proud and haughty as a cat.

All the while, Hux flings insults at him. Threats. Barbed words that no one else hears. Gestures that no one else sees.

It drives him to the brink.

“Sir,” Mitaka says, standing beside the ghostly, ghastly form of Hux. “High Command is requesting a meeting with you.”

“Where?” Ren gnashes.

Mitaka whimpers and leads him to a conference room, Hux following leisurely, as if he had been invited too.

The High Command has not visited in person yet. That is still true. They are too scared to even try to visit him. They are here only in hologram form. Ren does not know their names, just that they were remnants of the Empire, grey and sagging.

And then there is Hux, standing atop the conference table, his side to Ren.

Ren’s hair stands on end. Even after his death, Hux could not seem to understand that the First Order was _Ren’s_, that he had no place outside of what Ren gave him.

The men talk and talk and talk without end.

Ren pretends to take notes, here and there, and scribbles nonsense in his datapad.

Hux clucks his tongue. “_That’s a lie_.”

Ren raises a brow and the speaker only talks faster.

“_He’s gravely underestimating the ammunitions on the _Dogmatizer. _They were not involved on the Confrontation of Crait,_” Hux says, putting a gloved hand to his chin. “_There’s no reason for them to need a complete restock, unless you’ve got a sudden embezzling situation so soon after my passing_.”

Ren grits his teeth, unwilling to hear any more of Hux’s words, and waves him away.

Hux disappears into swirls of smoke—red, blue, green, and black.

He sits through the rest of meeting, but actually manages to pay attention. Ren begins to take real notes, of those little things that don’t quite make sense, don’t quite add up.

Someone, somewhere, is lying to him and it cannot be Hux.

Right?

*

After the meeting, Ren breezes from the conference chamber to the Finalizer’s mortuary. He had witnessed Hux’s body—pale, cold, and lifeless—be taken away. There was no ceremony for him, no funeral.

Nothing would be given in honor of a traitor, after all.

The mortuary is cold and sterile, burning Ren’s nostrils. And so very empty.

The trays and shelves that had held bodies were barren. Ren frowns. He feels nothing here, no residual emotion, just the chill the seeps into his bones, through his many layers.

“S-sir!” An officer says, saluting sharply. She’s dressed in grey scrubs. Her gloves are clean. “We didn’t expect you.”

He hums noncommittally. “I have a question.”

“It would be my pleasure to serve the Supreme Leader,” the officer says, her hand still held up, against her temples.

“Where,” Ren says, leaning close, “is Hux’s body?”

The officer gulps, her cheeks flushing. “Well, s-sir,” she says, looking away. Her hand remains up, in the salute.

“Where?” Ren repeats, shouting.

The officer shakes, tears coming to her warm, brown eyes. “H-he has been cremated,” she manages to say.

“And the cremains?” He doesn’t have the patience for this, this sniveling and sniffing adult who considers herself fit to be _an officer_ of Ren’s Order.

Her face only turns redder. Tears actually begin to trickle down her cheeks. “I kept them, sir.”

Ren rolls his eyes. So, she was one of _those_ officers.

“Lead me to where you keep it.”

The officer’s face lights up in surprise. She quickly ducks her head in a nod. She leads the ways through the halls, her shoes soundless. They take a lift together, with the officer’s gaze firmly affixed to her feet.

Her room is a little, messy thing. Objects are strewn about the floor: clothes, old ration wrappers, even holopads. But one shelf remains immaculate.

Photos of Hux printed on _flimsi_, of all things, sit on the shelf above her bed. There is a tin of tarine tea, still sealed, and a stack of datapads. The newest addition to the rather creepy collection is a plain urn.

Ren picks it up. It is nowhere near as heavy as he would have expected.

“Is this it?” he asks.

She nods frantically, holding out her hands. “Please be careful with it, sir,” the officer says, like he holds her life in his hands.

Ren nods. “I’ll be taking this. You’re lucky you won’t be investigated for treason, given how much memorabilia you have of the traitor,” he says lightly.

He does not stick around to watch her weep, shoulders quivering uncontrollably.

*

In his room, Ren sets the urn down beside the ash of his enemies. He debates whether or not to add Hux’s ash to the mix and ultimately decides against it.

Hux appears then, as if summoned. He bares a stormy expression on his face. “_What are you doing?_” he demands.

When Hux barks, the urn quivers. Ren’s abandoned cup of caf topples over, caf dripping from the table onto the floor. The lights flicker on and off. How strange.

Ren looks at him curiously. “Really,” Ren drawls out. “What brings _you_ here?”

Hux bares his teeth at him. Combined with his ghastly appearance, he looks like he’s some vengeful spirit, about to have his revenge. And, with everything not quite adding up, Ren could believe it.

“You tried to kill me,” Ren says flatly. “And then you corrected your precious little High Command when they lied to me.”

Hux’s little snarl falls right off his face. Blood drips from him, but never quite reaches the ground. “_You’re the _Supreme Leader,” he mocks. “Y_ou should have known that they were lying to you_.”

“Why would I expect my men to lie to me?” Ren asks. He seats himself on his table, never looking away from Hux’s bloodied eyes.

“_Because_,” Hux spits out, “_we were both played, _you fool_. I didn’t betray you. I was set up!_”

In some way, Ren had been prepared for Hux’s lies. Had been prepared for Hux to curse and whine and scream. Had expected anything but _that_ to come from his mouth.

Ren picks up his lightsaber and examines it. The exposed wires, the ducts. He turns it on. It hums with power in his hand, power out of reach of anything but himself. “And why exactly would they be so stupid to have their own pet General killed?”

Hux blinks rapidly. “_I haven’t figured that aspect out_,” he grinds out. “Y_ou’re the one with _kriffing_ mind reading abilities, for stars’ sake_!”

Ren waves him off, so that he vanishes with a gust of sudden wind.

Only then does Ren reach for his datapad, summoning a mouse droid to clean the spill. While he is at it, he rummages through security footage. Once, Hux had admitted to creeping through hours of footage. That was how Hux had found out the truth of Snoke’s death.

And Hux had never told a soul.

Ren selects the conference room, the cycle, and the time, but, curiously, there is nothing. He frowns and fiddles about.

There is footage of Hux entering the room, but it fizzles out just before someone entered behind him. There, Hux was frazzled, looking quite nervous about something. He opened his mouth and spoke, but the sound came out warbled and unintelligible.

Everything about this is suspicious.

The droid comes in, beeping politely, unaware of the heavy atmosphere. Ren nearly destroys it in a rage, but watches, instead, as it mops up the spill and collects the shards of his broken glass.

“You’re dismissed,” he tells the droid once its task is over.

It lets out a long, unhappy trill. There is so much more to clean in Ren’s quarters. Though he owned little and the rooms were sparse in furniture, Ren had done nothing to keep it tidy, following Hux’s death.

There was no point, after all, since he had no visitors.

The video could not be recovered, no matter how Ren fiddled with the settings. He does not consider himself too terrible with technology. In fact, he did some of his own modifications to the Silencer—to Hux’s dismay.

“_You’ll need a slicer_,” Hux says, very mildly. Ren looks up at him, to where he’s appeared. Hux stands right where Ren’s table is, giving the illusion that he had been cut at the waist. If possible, he is paler, his eyes not quite focused.

“And why would I need a slicer?” Ren asks.

Hux rolls his eyes. “T_he video has been tampered with. Even you should be able to see that_.”

Ren frowns and puts the datapad down. “Careful how you speak to me,” he says lowly. “Would you want me to send you back wherever it is you go?”

Hux stiffens. There is no hiding such a reaction. Even the smoke that trails from him goes stiff and straight.

Ren huffs. “Why did you go to the conference chamber?” he asks.

Even if Hux lies to him, Ren will surely find the truth.

Hux’s lips twist into an ugly smile. “_Why_,” he says, cruel and sharp, “_they told me you needed me urgently, that you were compromised. That turned out to not be the case now, didn’t it? And here I am, dead, while those that orchestrated this disaster still breathe and lie to your face_.”

Ren rages, turning on his lightsaber and cutting right through his table.

If Hux were tangible, in any sort of way, he would have been split right down the middle. As it is, Hux simple stands there, a brow raised. He’s not impressed in the slightest.

“Who was it then?” Ren asks slowly.

Hux lists off a set of names, without a hint of hesitation.

“And how do I know you are not lying?”

“_Search their minds_,” Hux says idly. He walks forwards, booted feet never quite meeting the ground. He settles himself on Ren’s couch as if he belonged there, as if he still lived, as if he never left. He is a vision, a nightmare.

Hux might have only clung to this half-life for revenge.

If Ren executed the true traitors and cleared Hux’s record posthumously, then Hux’s spirit would have no reason to remain in this plane of existence.

Two birds, one stone.

Although, he will never admit it, he will be lonely once Hux is well and truly gone.

*

Ren stirs trouble on the Finalizer. He reads everyone’s mind, one by one. He is not open about it. Merely, when he comes across a treacherous thought, he files the name and face away for later. He never knows when it may be useful to have some sort of connection.

One of the little traitors is a son of a man in High Command. How cute. Loyalty to one’s father.

He organizes another meeting with High Command, having done research on what the Order needs in the coming days.

While the self-flattering men preen and preach, Ren looks through their minds, as careful and precise as a monomolecular blade.

_Bah! The plan didn’t work as well as it could have. Oh well, with Armitage gone, it’ll be easier to play the fool._

_Who would have thought Ben Organa would be so bad when it came to politics? Naberrie must be turning over in her grave._

_Pity he’s still here. Really thought he and the cur would have the decency to finish each other off._

All of High Command had worked together on some neat little assassination attempt, to rid the First Order of its Supreme Leader and its General all at once.

Ren’s blood boils.

Now, for proof, and then the neat little execution.

Ren raises a hand. “That’ll be all.”

The man who had been talking pauses, midway through a word. “S-sir?” he says, sounding suddenly unsure.

“That’ll be all,” Ren grinds out, once again.

The holograms flicker and turn off, one by painful one, until Ren is alone once again. He buries his face in his hands and groans. If only he had listened to Hux, then, when Hux was shaking and afraid, a monomolecular knife glittering in his hand.

He finishes his caf, long gone cold. Bitter and acidic, it is a different sort of pain to think about.

*

_They celebrated over a bottle of fine, expensive wine from Naboo. It tasted of ripe fruits, so sweet. Hux had poured for Ren first, then himself._

_Ren watched with wary eyes._

_“You don’t think I’d stoop to poisoning you, do you?” Hux drawled. He takes a long gulp from his cup, his eyes never wavering from Ren’s. His lips came away stained._

_They drank together, draining the bottle. Ren had been so focused on the stray strands of ginger hair falling limply across Hux’s forehead._

_He didn’t think—he never does—but simply reached out, running a hand through Hux’s hair._

_Hux did not seem alarmed. No. He merely peaked up at Ren through the fan of his lashes._

_Between one moment and the next, Hux had crawled into Ren’s lap, arms thrown over Ren’s shoulders. Hux tasted of the wine, like a fruit so close to ripening that its skin had burst. Ren let his hands paw at Hux, feel him through the layers of his uniform._

_Hux leaned back and away at the first curious mew._

_Millicent saw fit to join them, her tail held high in greeting. She meowed again, a long, piteous thing, until Hux stepped neatly away and picked her up, cradling her close._

_“Are you hungry?” Hux asked Millicent, pressing his nose to hers._

_Ren all but growled, now that he was no longer the sole object of Hux’s affections._

_“Hush, you,” Hux said, a hand upon Ren’s cheek. “I’ll return to the matter soon enough.”_

_Ren snorted and leaned back, taking comfort in the plush, blue couch._

_*_

Hux appears to him, blood caked between his teeth. His gaze does not quite meet Ren, but rather just slightly past him. He does not speak or move for a long time, as if he cannot see, cannot hear, cannot feel the world that he haunts.

“Hux,” Ren barks, and that is enough fro Hux to blink and bring some measure of sharpness back to his gaze. “Where can I find a slicer?”

Hux rolls his eyes openly. “_Mitaka, of course_.”

“Mitaka, really?” Ren finds himself repeating. “The mousy officer?” The one he had choked before. The one that had come to Ren, to convince Ren to eat.

Clearly, there is more to him than Ren had considered.

“_Everyone has their hobbies_.” Hux hums. “_Why don’t you summon him?_” he asks.

It is late in the cycle’s shifts, surely during Mitaka’s assigned rest.

But Hux does not waver. He merely stands in the corner of the room, unblinking, nearly blending in with the shadows, but for the shock of ginger hair and his horrid, pale face.

Ren sends a quick message to Mitaka.

_Report to my rooms immediately._

It is only a few minutes later when he receives a response: _Yes, sir._

When Mitaka arrives, he is a little out of breath, cheeks flushed, and his hair is askew. He had been sleeping when Ren summoned him, that much is obvious, though he tries to hide the heaviness of sleep behind a clean, pressed uniform. “Sir,” he says, saluting when Ren greets him at the door.

“Get in,” Ren says.

Mitaka hesitates, but only for a second, before crossing over the threshold. The door shuts behind him, startling him again.

Ren doesn’t say a word, merely returns to where he had abandoned his datapad, amongst the ruins of his table.

Mitaka watches him with wide eyes. He has removed his hat and begun to wring the life out of it. “Sir,” he finally croaks. “May I ask… what have you summoned me here for?”

He thinks that today is his last day in this galaxy. He thinks that Ren will kill him.

Ren very well might.

“I’ve heard you’re something of a slicer,” Ren drawls out.

Mitaka’s entire face goes red. He stammers, chokes on his own saliva, and then forces out a: “Oh, I-it’s a hobby. I swear, sir, it is no threat to the First Order. I live to serve. I—”

Ren holds up a hand. “I am in need of a slicer’s talents.”

“Oh.” All the breath leaves Mitaka at once and he deflates physically. “I would be happy to—”

Ren loads the video of Hux in the conference room, seconds before it had escalated to violence. The garbled audio is a nuisance.

Mitaka winces. “Oh.” Sorrow, fear, and confusion drift from him. He takes the holopad in his hands. He swallows and then swallows again. “Oh.”

From his corner, Hux snorts again. “On with it,” he says. He does not want to _deal _with Mitaka’s emotions.

Mitaka does not hear him, but it seems that the Force works in mysterious ways. Mitaka begins to fiddle with the settings in a way that Ren could never. “I will need my tools,” Mitaka finally says, looking up and meeting Ren’s eyes. With a task at hand, Mitaka is focused and steady and competent.

Suddenly, he knows how Hux had tolerated his presence for so many years.

“I’ll send for them,” Ren says. He summons a mouse droid and gives it its instructions.

It beeps and trills and carries on. It may be the same droid that cleaned up Ren’s mess from before, clearly having not noticed the destroyed table.

They do not wait long for the droid to return with a slim case of tools clenched in an appendage.

Mitaka squats to retrieve them. “Thank you,” he tells the droid.

It beeps its welcome.

Ren grows bored, watching Mitaka work. But slowly, meticulously, Mitaka restores the audio and the cut footage. Ren practically leans over the trembling man as they watch Hux’s men turn around and betray him.

It’s a planned slaughter.

Hux fights back, with his blaster, with his monomolecular dagger. He sustains injuries too. Blood paints the room in gore.

One man, one of Hux’s lieutenants, runs away. This man, Ren finds, is the one who had told him of the commotion.

Otherwise, Hux would have died with no one knowing.

Ren frowns.

Sorrow, fear, surprise, and anger spiral out of Mitaka, until his emotions smother the air in Ren’s quarters. “General Hux,” Mitaka says faintly. His eyes have gone misty. He looks up to Ren, imploringly. “Supreme Leader, sir, look. General Hux did not betray you. It was a set up!”

What he hears instead is: _You betrayed Hux._

Ren nods, taking the datapad in hand. He pulls up transport logs and frowns. Sure enough, they did not go so far as to hide their tracks.

Ren copies the video and the transport logs. He will need them soon enough.

“Please, Supreme Leader,” Mitaka says, clearly misunderstanding his intentions. “You have to make this right!”

Ren resists the surging urge to push Mitaka aside. No, no, it wouldn’t do. The man’s skills were proven necessary. No need to make an enemy out of him.

“I will,” Ren says instead, surprising Mitaka with his easy compliance.

Mitaka stands there, rooted to the ground. He doesn’t leave until Ren shoos him away.

Only after he is gone does he send out messages.

*

He requests the presence of High Command for Alpha cycle. At the same time, he requests a platoon of Stormtroopers to be ready for their arrival.

Hux appears to him as Ren carefully types each word out. “_So informal_,” Hux snipes.

But there’s no real bite to it.

Ren does not respond.

“See how easily you found the truth?” Hux drawls out. His face is made only more pale by the light of the datapad. “Perhaps you should wait before jumping to hasty conclusions.”

Ren continues with his work.

“_Will you no longer rise to bait?_” Hux asks. “_My, my_.”

“Ghosts tend to have a purpose in this world,” Ren responds. “Once your purpose is completed, nothing should tether you to me any longer.”

Hux is quiet for a long time.

In the end, Ren does not even have to banish him. Hux leaves of his own volition. The room is quiet and cold, even more so without the ghost.

*

Hux returns by the time Ren’s plan unfolds. He watches with cool, unconcerned eyes. The old, useless men of High Command are removed of their weapons and brought to their knees.

Had Phasma still been around, she would have followed out the executions.

Instead, Ren has a Judicial Stormtrooper carry out the act.

Some men cry and quiver. Some go silently. Each and every one of them has hatred burning in their eyes.

Not one of them will return as a ghost, however.

Their heads roll, leaving streaks of gore before an audience. One head rolls to Ren’s foot. He holds back the urge to kick it between its unseeing eyes. He turns, expecting to see Hux gone, but Hux is still stubbornly there.

Ren raises his brows and says nothing.

“Have someone dispose of the bodies,” Ren says. “But, have the skulls cleaned and returned to me.”

He’s met with a chorus of “Yes, sir” and no one dares meet his eye.

Only once he is alone with Hux in a lift does he scream, punching the wall. It shudders but does not shatter under the weight of the blow.

“_Well done_,” Hux says dryly, not impressed, never impressed. “_And why is it that am I still here?_”

“_You _think _I _know that?” Ren asks. When his teeth click together, they crack ominously.

“_You seem to be the Force expert, last I checked_,” Hux says, continuing. His eyes have a peculiar, dull look to them. “_That is how it works, yes? Kill the master and all that._”

“You know nothing,” Ren rages.

Hux has the audacity to raise his chin, to look _down _at him with his bruised, bloody eyes. “_I know everything_,” he says, hoarse, but so very sure of himself. “_And I know that you would be lost without me, Kylo Ren_.”

Ren laughs, hollow and empty. “As if I weren’t lost _with_ you. Now you’re just a thorn in my side.”

The lift stops and opens its doors. Officers don’t quite meet his eyes as they shuffle in after saluting. The doors close again.

“_Was it really so terrible?_” Hux asks. He speaks so quietly than Ren nearly does not hear him.

He does not answer, cannot answer, with so many officers around him.

When the lift stops at Ren’s floor, he trudges out. The officers salute once again, soundless but for the sounds of rustling clothing. Hux follows in his footsteps, dripping spectral blood and gore that fades soon after it falls.

“Lights, 50%,” Ren says, once he enters his quarters, shutting the door behind him.

Hux walks through the shut door. “_What will you do?_” Hux asks.

But Ren does not answer. He continues further in his quarters, into the fresher. He washes with real water, letting the cold water take away the cycle’s events.

His heart races, but, as he controls his breathing, it slows.

Here, Hux does not disturb him. Here, he is alone.

*

Ren wakes up only because of how foul his mouth tastes. He sits up and groans at his datapad. He has slept through alarms and messages. No matter. He is the Supreme Leader and he is allowed to do as he pleases.

He makes himself a strong cup of caf and then adds plenty of milk and sugar to it. He drinks and lets himself enjoy it.

Only then does he realize the silence. He rubs sleep from his eyes.

Hux is still there, hiding amongst the shadows of the room. Even when Ren meets his unwavering gaze, Hux says nothing.

So. He has not completed his business yet.

Tragic.

The datapad rings. He looks at it strangely.

The new notification reads: _Cat found in the cafeteria—_

Ren does not bother reading the rest. He runs. He leaves his quarters in yesterday’s wrinkled clothing and does not stop until he has reached the cafeteria.

True to the notification, there is a cat. Its fur is matted and dirty. It hisses at everyone who tries to approach.

Hux appears at Ren’s shoulder and the neutral expression breaks. “_Millicent_,” he breathes out.

The cat’s ears perk up at that. Millicent begins to purr, rumbling out of her thin body uncontrollably. She runs to Hux’s side, winding her body where he would be standing, had he been corporeal. Millicent has never been very talkative around Ren, but in the moment she assaults Hux with an unending stream of meows and chirps as loudly as she can.

The other officers who had tried to coax her affection with bits of food and kissy noises are surprised to see the cat love the space beside Ren so fiercely.

Ren moves and snatches Millicent up by her nape. She dangles from his arm, but this does little to impede her relentless purring.

_“Be gentle with her!_” Hux barks. He lifts a hand to his mouth to conceal his horror.

“She’s fine,” Ren says, annoyed.

“Is she yours, sir?” an officer asks, assuming that he did not care for his animal just as he did not seem to care for anything around him.

Ren grunts wordlessly and turns on his heel, returning to his quarters with Millicent. Hux follows them, level with Millicent. The cat stares at him, blinking, sending all the affection in her tiny body to him.

The amount of affection rolling out of the cat is nearly enough to nauseate Ren.

Not soon enough, he enters his room and drops the cat unceremoniously to her feet.

She _murp_s and continues attempting to mark Hux with her scent.

“_You should treat her with more dignity_,” Hux sniffs. He crouches and reaches for her. Millicent trills but his hand is unable to make contact with her. Sadness that overpowers and pulls drags Ren into an abyss that he is only barely able to crawl out of.

“Control yourself,” Ren barks.

“_You should feed her_,” Hux says. “_She looks so thin._”

And dirty. And matted. Like she had gone half wild in Hux’s absence.

“What does she eat?” Ren asks.

“_She’s a little carnivore_,” Hux says quietly. “_I had special cans of food for her. Imported. Would anyone keep my things after I died?_”

The sorrow crests again and it takes all of Ren’s power not to dismiss Hux.

“One of your… fans kept your ashes. And memorabilia. Perhaps cat food will fit in that category,” Ren says dryly. He plucks his datapad from its spot, nestled between the cushions on his couch and sends a message to the mortuary reading: _One of you must acquire cans of cat food._

He had not learned the name of that particular officer, but it didn’t really matter. Hux’s name had been cleared. No one would be too terribly ashamed to admit their admiration once again.

He does not wait too long before that officer from before appears, still red cheeked and trembling, holding a box of cat supplies in her arms. She salutes clumsily, nearly dropping all of her things. “Supreme Leader, sir!” she says.

Ren takes the box from her and sees that it is not only filled with cat food, but also a litter box, a cushion, and many, many toys. He sets the box aside. “What is your name, officer?” he asks.

“A-ah, I am Sanitation Officer Daaé,” she says. But she is not too interested in him. All of her attention has focused on Millicent. “You found Millicent! Oh, I knew it!”

Millicent perks up at the sound of her name. She looks over warily at the intruder.

Daaé smiles at the cat. “Please take care of her, sir,” she says. Then her attention is drawn to the urn, standing beside a line of cleaned skulls and Ren’s container of ash. “Oh, how sweet,” she says of the display.

“That will be all,” Ren says.

Daaé is disappointed but does not bring it up. She nods and holds back a smile. “If you need more cat food, please feel free to contact me, sir.”

Ren raises a brow at the display of boldness from her.

Hux lets out a bark of laughter only once she’s left. “_I’ve never seen you so speechless._”

Ren scowls at him. “You try to deal with the emotions others exude,” Ren snarls. “She is louder than most.”

“_Well, unfortunately I cannot take up your offer as I appear to be dead and not Force sensitive_,” Hux replies easily, just as vicious. The blood between his teeth drips down his bottom lip.

They are two rabid beasts, unable to pull away from one another. They are fanged, clawed creatures, who have not known kind hands.

“I need to meditate,” Ren announces.

Hux rolls his eyes and mumbles about Force nonsense beneath his breath.

Ren does not understand why Hux is still here, why he is still a ghost, why the two of them are bound in this strange way. He had murdered Hux, yes, but the deed had been avenged. Those conspirators who had brought on Hux’s untimely death were nothing but decoration now.

Ren goes to his bedroom and sits on the floor, back against his bed. He shuts his eyes and breathes, simply breathes. There is peace, at least for a while, silence for him to think in.

He cannot even find solitude.

Ren opens his eyes and finds Hux standing before him. “What?” Ren spits.

“_You didn’t open a can of food for Millicent_,” Hux says slowly, like he’s speaking to an idiot. “_She is hungry_.”

Ren sticks out his lower lip in a pout. “Oh, how foolish of me,” he mocks. “I forgot to feed the mangy cat her food.”

The room grows so cold that Ren’s breath is visible. “I’ll feed her,” he says. “Stop this.”

“_Stop what?_” Hux says icily.

“Stop whatever it is you’re doing,” Ren hisses. “You’re affecting your environment.” Which shouldn’t actually be possible, but Hux is stubborn enough to overcome any circumstance.

Hux tilts his chin up. “_What are you talking about?_”

He doesn’t know, doesn’t feel it. Hux has no idea what he is doing or how he is doing it.

“Never mind.” Ren adjusts the heating in the room. When he turns around from the thermostat, his mother is there, sitting on _his_ bed.

Leia is pale and drawn. Her long, grey hair spills down her shoulders, down from her elaborate braids. Her eyes are focused on Hux and Hux alone. She doesn’t speak for a long time, but when she does, she says, “So it’s true. You killed him.”

The shape of Ren’s hands are unmistakable across Hux’s throat, peaking above the collar to his uniform.

“_You can see me?_” Hux says dryly. “_How good to finally make your acquaintance_.”

Leia looks at him coldly. “I don’t think you should be saying this now, after all that you’ve done.”

Hux rolls his eyes openly. It isn’t as if Leia could do much to him now that he is dead.

“Why can _you _see him?” Ren snarls.

Leia looks at him like he has personally disappointed her. He wouldn’t be surprised if he did. She has never once been proud of him. “You’ve had two masters in the Force and you’ve killed them both, but it seems that you have not learned a thing.”

Ren summons his lightsaber to him and turns it on. It hums and crackles, filled with power.

“_If he doesn’t know, why don’t you enlighten him?_” Hux says.

“I’ll give you both a hint.” Leia eyes Ren warily. “Only Force users are known to become ghosts,” she says. Leia does not wait for Ren’s reaction. She vanishes after she finishes speaking.

Ren yells and stabs where she had been sitting on his bed, filling the air with the stench of burning fabric.

“_Well done_,” Hux says dryly, clapping. “_You’ve ruined yet another piece of furniture_.”

Ren whirls over the point the saber at him. “You should be angry too. She lied, she always lies.” He deactivates the lightsaber and tucks it away. “She’ll give us a hint,” he mocks. “But it’s useless.”

Hux is quiet.

“Do you have nothing to say?” Ren asks him in disbelief, turning to get a look at the ghost.

Hux’s eyes are shut. His shoulders hitch as if he is taking a breath. “_There is something_,” he says.

“Something?” Ren prods.

“_When I was young, my father ran experiments on me_,” Hux says slowly. “_I forgot most of them, but it appears that some of my memories are returning to me._”

“Why are you telling me this?” Ren asks.

“_Because you are alive. Because you can find out _what the fuck_ is happening to me_.” Hux’s eyes are pale chips of ice, so cold and so desolate.

Ren looks at him strangely. Hux’s face is still but fury and fear and all the negativity that surrounds him pulses. “What is happening to you?” he asks instead.

Hux blinks rapidly. “_When… when you force me away_,” he says, swallowing with difficulty, “_I find myself back in the closet_.”

Ren purses his lips. “The closet…”

“_My father locked me in one when he wanted to punish me. Sometimes he forgot about me for hours, for days._” Hux’s voice sounds very far away and he flickers like a hologram. “_All the reconditioning methods that were tested on me… All of the injections… there must be data of it somewhere_.”

Ren’s hair stands on end.

"You're not Force sensitive," Ren spits out. "I would have felt it."

He would have noticed. Would have seen the shining potential within him.

And, worse, Snoke would have known too. Ren's stomach twists.

Hux looks at him unblinkingly. "_Like you felt the conspiracy before you killed me? Like how you felt the Scavenger was trustworthy? Like how you felt Snoke whispering into your ear since even before you were born?_"

Ren feels cold all over. When he breathes out shakily, he can see it. "Snoke manipulated me in the womb?" he says very quietly.

Hux laughs and laughs and laughs, raw and as painful as nails against a durasteel wall. "_If you didn't notice that, then you are truly more hopeless than I could have ever guessed! All we ever were to Snoke were pawns. He used us as he saw fit, moved us across the holochess board, sacrificed us when necessary._" He sneers.

"_There must be someone still alive_," Hux mumbles, the ferocity melting from his narrow frame. "_Someone who would know something_."

"I executed all of the traitors," Ren says.

Hux circles him, dripping gore with every step. His footsteps leave dark impressions that fade away seconds later. "_Mm. But people are never truly gone, not really_."

"What do you mean by that?" Ren is close to dismissing him, shoving him back into the closet his father left him in.

But he cannot bare to look at Hux's glassy eyes once again.

"_Their work must live on. Their digital ghost, their footsteps on the holoweb_," Hux says. He stops in place. "_You still haven't fed Millicent._"

Ren shuts his eyes. He had forgotten again. "I'll do that." He shouldn't be taking orders from Hux, but Hux is dead and gone and there is no one left to care for his cat.

Hux follows him when he goes and Millicent is quick to return to his side, still so desperate to rub her face against his filthy clothing. Hux smiles, soft, sweet, and so very sad. Ren pretends to have not seen it. After all, Ren had never seen him smile like that when he had still been alive.

Ren opens one of the cans Daaé had left him and spoons the stinking mass into a pink cat-themed bowl. But Millicent does not eat. She remains at Hux's side, meowing and chirping for his attention.

He waits, not patiently.

"_You should eat, Millie_," Hux tells his cat.

"She won't understand you," says Ren irritably. "She's an animal."

Hux clucks his tongue at him and says nothing, his eyes only for Millicent.

Ren leaves him to it, finding his datapad. It seems that there is still work to be done.

*

There are many documents he is able to access now, overriding the deceased High Command's codes and passwords. He downloads them to his datapad, to be read later.

There is an eye boggling amount of classified projects.

The names are not exactly enlightening--just strings of letters and numbers. Ren rubs his temples, soothing away a budding headache. He does not understand how so many officers sit in datapits all day, sorting through streams of information and compiling documents and reports.

He wonders, idly, how inappropriate it would be to hoist some of the work onto his lessers.

Then again, he does not know what the documents might hold and does not want to help speed up his own downfall.

Ren goes through them slowly, line by line. There are atrocities that he had never dreamed of, weapons that could obliterate worlds. A lot of the blueprints have Hux's messy crawl written in their corners. He saves some for later, to be commissioned, once Hux's ghost is dealt with.

He pages through work done on the Stormtrooper program. He skips through those reports filed by Hux himself.

Ren needed something older.

Something from Brendol Hux's hand.

Ren eats what is sent to him, not really tasting it. Mitaka had delivered the tray, eyes large and worried. He had seen the datapads scattered around the room. Having many is a necessity. Sometimes, they crumble in his hands, broken by the weight of his anger.

"Sir," Mitaka says. "Is there anything more you need?"

He is still buzzing with the excitement that came with rooting out the conspiracy and restoring Hux's honor, however ridiculous that is.

Ren pauses.

Mitaka was--_is?_\--loyal to Hux. Ren proved some sort of bizarre loyalty to Hux, at least in Mitaka's eyes. Mitaka is still afraid of him, though unlikely to betray him.

Ren hands him one of the datapads. "You'll help me," he says.

"Is... that an order, sir?" Mitaka says. Already, apprehension makes its home beneath his skin.

"I'm looking for certain reports," Ren says. "You won't have to report to the bridge."

If anything, that makes Mitaka more nervous. "Yes sir," he says quietly, hiding his fears. He remains standing, datapad in hand. Only after a while, he says, "...What am I looking for exactly, Supreme Leader, sir?"

Ren closes his eyes and suppresses the urge to fling the man across the room. "Documents from the early Stormtrooper program. Preferably before Hux took over the program."

Mitaka looks at him strangely. "...General Armitage Hux."

Ren hums. That much should be obvious. He had never called Hux's father Hux. That seemed too strange. "Look for reports from Brendol."

"Yes sir." Mitaka is quiet and does not complain. He researches diligently and takes no breaks. Not even when Ren goes to the fresher or eats a ration bar. He does not even blink when Ren makes himself caf, though he can feel how Mitaka wants a cup too.

There is much that Ren had not known about the First Order.

"Here, sir," Mitaka says quietly, handing him a datapad. The folder of documents dates back to 5 ABY.

Ren opens the first and nearly loses grip on the datapad.

*

He reads every last document within the folder and then some more. It does not diminish the growing sickness that spreads up from his belly. He is beginning to regret eating all those ration bars.

Millicent has fallen asleep, curled up on an unused datapad.

Her owner stands beside her, smoke whirling away from him in waves. Hux's eyes are chips of ice. "_Well_?" he says, tonelessly. "_What have you found?_"

"You are aware your father tested methods of reconditioning on you," Ren says. He had done the math. Hux could not have been more than five years old when it began. The last records indicating that Hux had been a subject dated back to when he was roughly twelve or thirteen.

"_Yes_," Hux rasps. He is pale, bloodless. His lips part into a sneer.

"Are you aware that the Academy on Arkanis has been active in the past few months?" Ren drawls out slowly.

This catches Hux off-guard. For someone who claimed to know everything, he sure didn't have a clue about that. It's almost enough to make Ren smile, in the worst kind of way.

"_It couldn't be_..." Hux mutters. He paces the length of the room and vanishes. He returns a moment later, looking distraught. "_If it is active, you must go there._"

"I think you shouldn't be the one giving me orders," Ren says.

Hux looks him in the eyes, his gaze never wavering. "_You didn't know either,_" Hux says. "_There still may be traitors still alive. Careful, Ren, do you want to risk your rule so early?_"

Ren bristles at that implication.

"_So, leave Mitaka in charge of things and take one officer you trust with you to Arkanis,_" Hux says, continuing to order him.

Ren doesn't look at him. He collects his things--his lightsaber, the datapad, a tube of bacta.

_"Do you even trust any of your officers?_"

Hux's accusation stops him cold.

Ren turns slowly to look at him. "Why should I trust any of your officers if I couldn't even trust you?" he sneers out.

Hux shuts his eyes and lets out a breath, as if he is deflating. "_You trusted me. You did. And that's why High Command chose to make you believe that I had betrayed your trust._"

Ren leaves his quarters and heads out into the halls. Hux follows him, a ghastly specter.

"_Take Opan_."

"Why Opan?" Ren asks.

If the patrolling Stormtroopers notice their Supreme Leader talking to himself, they kindly do not bring it up.

"Captain Opan is a professional," Hux says dryly. Opan was one of Hux's personal officers, the only one with a rank above a lieutenant. "It would do you good to have him at your side."

"You had him kill for you." It is not a question, but a statement.

"Yes," Hux says mildly. "He is good at his job. And he can help to keep you alive."

"Or kill me." Ren rolls his eyes. "Why send an executioner with me?"

"Perhaps you will have need of his services," Hux says lightly. He brims with a strange nervousness and fades in and out of existence. "You do not know what you will find."

*

_There was a ball held on a neutral-turned-First Order world._

_Ren had danced with his General and no other. _

_Perhaps some would assume it had something to do with romance. Or their working relationship. Or something secret, something beautiful, if the single holo caught by a camdroid was to be believed._

_Rather, Ren did not know how to dance, had not danced formally since his mother sent him away to his uncle. and did not care to learn and that he needed someone to snark with in the corners of the ballroom._

*

Ren does end up taking Opan along with him. The man very carefully does not meet his eyes, instead looking just above Ren's ear. There is a lingering distrust of Ren within him, one that only abated when Ren cleared Hux's name posthumously.

It is not a long ride to Arkanis, but silence settles between them uncomfortably.

Hux's ghost settles in the back of the ship, nestled amongst the shadows. He has not said a word since they stepped onto the cruiser.

Ren lands the ship beside the Academy of Arkanis. He leaves the ship first, Opan following shortly. The Academy's exterior has fallen into disarray. It's dingy and dirty, with wild plants growing over the structures.

"Sir," Opan says. "What are you expecting to see here?"

"Anything." Ren brushes him off and strides into the dilapidated building.

The interior paints a different story than the exterior.

It is well taken care of. Updated, even.

Opan halts at that revelation, craning his neck to examine his surroundings.

Ren pauses. He can feel another person, sense their heartbeat and breath. "Someone is here," he says.

"Oh, shit," comes a small voice before the scrabble of slippered feet against smooth ground.

Ren launches into a run, barreling in the direction of the footsteps. Opan is behind him, having drawn out his blaster. "Don't shoot!" Ren orders.

A door is pushed ajar, revealing a set of stairs.

Ren does not hesitate before leaping to the bottom.

He catches the figure crouch and duck between a set of machines, a flash of gold, of grey. Ren's hand snatches the figure's arm and he drags the mystery man out from the shadows.

For a second, Ren thinks he is seeing a ghost. Not Hux's own, but someone close.

They have the same bone structure, the same nose, the same mouth, parted to reveal his teeth. But this man's eyes are artificial and painful, glassy with fear. A messy tattoo is scrawled above his brow, reading _male_. His hair is a darker shade of ginger than Hux, falling messily to his shoulders.

"Who are you?" Ren asks, his thumb pressing hard against the man's wrist.

The man whimpers and attempts to pull away. It's almost sad.

Opan joins them, red faced and out of breath. He holds onto his blaster tight, but when he sees the man he quite nearly loses his grip. "Hux?" Opan says quietly.

But it cannot be Hux.

Not when Hux's ghost is lingering at Ren's side.

The man sputters and coughs. "Please," he says desperately. "I didn't want this. I didn't want any of this."

"_What is this?_" Hux asks quietly, his ghastly form losing all color.

Ren reaches out and touches the man's temple with his free hand and lets himself in.

*

_His life started suddenly._

_One moment he did not exist, and the next he was coughing up bacta, naked on the floor of some laboratory. A woman had thrown him clothing._

Who was she?

_She was dark haired and dark eyed, scars running along the left side of her face. She was not kind, not at all. "My name is Madeline Madrigal. Congratulations. You are the first successful clone of General Armitage Hux."_

_There were scars on his body that he did not remember, did not understand. Marred palms, with scars in the shape of half crescents. Brands along his back of the Empire's starburst. _

_"Who am I?" he asked her._

_She leaned down, pressing the clothes more firmly into his arms. "That isn't the right question. You should have asked who you will be."_

_He shuddered, afraid, and looked anywhere but at Madrigal._

_It was ages after. He spent much of his waking time memorizing habits and patterns and vocal ticks of the man he was created to replace. He was shown surveillance video after surveillance video, all to copy Hux's self assured stride._

_But his shoulders curved in on themselves._

_He was thin, lanky, useless._

_There were more clones. He was so very replaceable. They were sleeping, still, eyes shut as they floated within bacta tanks. Many times, when Madrigal had left for her own amusement, he would sneak back into the laboratory and stare at his others. For what purpose had they all been made?_

_Just who was Hux?_

_He knew that Hux had a fear of lightning storms, a fondness for bitter tarine tea, an aptitude towards all things technological. He did not know the sound of Hux's laughter or how Hux might spend idle time relaxing or even if Hux had someone who loved him._

_And then Hux died and the Supreme Leader had been the one to kill him. _

_And he and all of the unactivated clones became truly useless._

_*_

The man is crying or, at least, he is trying to. His shoulders shake and his face wrinkles and reddens in an ugly way. No tears leave his artificial eyes. He hyperventilates, hot breath hitting Ren’s face.

Ren does not let go of him. “Who are you?” he demands. “What is your name?”

The man shakes all over.

“Hux,” Open repeats softly, his brows knitted together.

But the man is not Hux. Could never hope to be Hux.

“They called me Techie,” the man says, low and scared. He has Hux’s clipped accent, the one that he had learned to cover up his Arkanisan one.

“And just who would they be?” Ren asks, applying pressure.

“T-the medical scientists. The geneticists. There w-were many of them.” Words spill past Techie’s lips like water. He is so very afraid and it chokes Ren.

“Ask him,” Hux says, speaking for the first time. He drifts closer, so close that Ren would feel his warmth had he still been alive. “How did he get the scars on his hands?”

Ren relays the words.

Techie sputters, his eyes fixed on the curve of Ren’s mouth. “They gave them to me,” he squawks. “T-the medical officers. To more closely resemble General Hux.”

“And how could they ever think _you _could replace him?” Ren asks. Something gives within Techie’s wrist and pain radiates throughout his form. “I can see into your mind. You are nothing like him.”

Techie’s face scrunches up more, growing alarmingly pale.

“Sir,” Opan says.

Ren lets go of Techie, scarcely restraining himself from flinging the clone like he had the original. Techie falls to his knees, cradling his wrist to his chest. He heaves his breaths, like each is an unsurpassable labor.

“Tell me,” Ren says, stooping down to Techie’s level. “Is there anyone else still here?”

“Mama,” Techie babbles.

“Your… mother?”

Hux’s ghost stiffens. He flickers and shudders and comes back again, seeping gore.

Techie shakes. “Officer Madrigal,” he whimpers. “She told me to call her that.”

“Take us to her,” Ren says.

Techie trembles as he leads them, but not from chill. He is so terribly afraid, though he tries to still his shaking hands. Opan cannot but stare at him, at his curled up shoulders, seeing a ghost where there is none.

Hux is indignant at Ren’s side. “_They cloned me_,” he says, voice but a hoarse whisper. “_They cloned me and then killed me. What was the point?_” He huffs.

Techie stops suddenly, his hands fisted in his sweater. “This is Ma-Ma’s office,” he says quietly.

Ren looks between him and Opan. “Stay with him and make sure he doesn’t get any ideas,” Ren barks at Opan.

Opan nods, saluting Ren sharply.

Ren forces open the door and stalks forwards. The room is dark and smells heavily of sterilization. It burns his nostrils. A woman types on a console not even turning to look at who is intruding on her space.

“Techie,” she calls. “You know I don’t like to be interrupted.”

“I know,” Ren says lowly. He powers on his lightsaber.

Madrigal throws herself out of her chair and pulls a blaster on him. Her face is scarred, twisted with hatred. “_You_,” she hisses. “How did you find out?”

Ren twirls his blade. It hums menacingly in the half-dark. “A little birdie told me about your little laboratory,” he says. “Tell me, did you really think all this would work?”

She bares her teeth at him in a snarl. There’s no tell, no sign, before she fires three times in succession.

Ren holds up his free hand and freezes the blaster bolts midair. He steps neatly out of their way and lets go. The bolts hit the durasteel wall behind him with a scream. He drags her forwards, until her throat meets his palm.

Madrigal never looks away, staring at him hatefully. “Long live the… First… Order,” she rasps out.

And then the light leaves her eyes.

Ren tosses her corpse aside. Hux sneers down at her and steps over her body. He cranes his neck, looking at the console Madrigal had abandoned.

“_There are more clones_,” Hux says simply.

Ren frowns. “Why?”

Opan enters the room, Techie in tow. Opan keeps a hand on Techie’s shoulder, but it looks as if it is more to reassure Techie than to keep him from running off. “Sir,” Opan says, deliberately not looking at the corpse in the room. “Now what?”

“_Tell him to download all he can_,” Hux says.

Ren looks at him. “Download the data.”

Opan complies, though he is certainly no data technician. He sets to work at the console, fingers flying over the buttons. He removes several datasticks from his pocket and attaches them to the console. “It will take a while,” Opan warns.

“Fine. Our business is not done here yet.” Ren turns to Techie, who flinches back. “Do you know where the other clones are kept?”

Though Ren is careful to phrase it as a question, Techie takes it as a command. He nods furiously. “Yes, sir,” he says in a quavering voice. He is so very convinced that Ren will kill him.

Ren will not correct him of that notion. Not yet.

Techie leads him through narrow halls, with flickering lights overhead. Hux’s ghost trails behind, not ever saying a word. Together, they unnerve Ren.

They have the same DNA and yet they are so different.

Techie leads them down a narrow stairwell. Where Madrigal’s office had stand heavily of antiseptic, the basement smelled of bacta. Copious amount of bacta.

The lights turn on row by row overhead, shining down on cylindrical bacta tanks. Ren wrinkles his nose. Most of the tanks are empty.

A lonely clone sits in a tank. Hux’s mouth falls open and a soft breathy noise escapes him, and yet he says nothing about the clone before them, nothing about the whole situation.

Techie takes hesitant steps forwards, until he is right before the tank. He stares up at the sleeping clone, his hands clasped together about his chest. There is an expression Ren can’t quite read about Techie’s face. “This one hasn’t been activated yet,” he says quietly, as if not to disturb the other clone.

Ren circles it.

This clone is thin, waifish. Hux had hid much underneath layers of clothing and strategic padding, as Ren suspected. Scars line the clone’s bodies, scars that the unactivated clone surely had not earned.

Ren taps through the screens that light up on the tank.

About vitals. About scarring. About Hux’s long and tedious medical record.

Then there is a single line of interest.

_Force-Suppression chip not yet surgically inserted._

“Do you have a Force-Suppression chip within you?” Ren asks, almost too casually.

“Yes,” Techie says. His nails dig into the palms of his hands as nervousness spirals from him. “Madrigal said it was for my own safety.”

“Mm.” Ren turns, intending on looking at Hux, but the ghost is no longer there. He frowns. He cannot sense Hux as he did, no creeping sensation across his spine, no unnatural chill. And he cannot reach out to Hux either.

It is like the man had finally vanished.

Perhaps this was his final task. Perhaps he had moved on.

Somehow, that notion did not sit well with Ren.

This, _this_, could not be the end.

Ren wanders through the room slowly, unwilling to accept just how easily his haunting ended. He finds a little side room, its consoles smashed to bits, and tens of bodies, burnt beyond recognition.

He shakes his head and walks away.

Techie lets out a soft gasps and steps away from the tank. The screens have come to life, displaying vitals as the clone within trashes and chokes.

“Move,” Ren barks and Techie needs no more instruction. He runs and hides because those coward legs of his are embedded into his DNA. Ren draws out his saber and shatters the glass of the tank.

Bacta floods out, along with the pale body of the clone.

Ren catches him and cradles him to his chest. The clone’s pale lashes flutter to reveal eyes like chips of ice. He coughs and coughs, bacta dribbling down his chin.

“Breathe,” Ren says, hand against his narrow chest. “Just breathe.”

The clone shudders in his arms and gives him such a _look_ that Ren realizes he is no clone.

“Hux?” Ren asks.

The man in his arms bares his teeth in a snarl. “What the _kriff _happened?” Hux asks, voice raw.

“You think _I _did this?” Ren demands. He would never have considered an empty shell as a vessel for Hux’s ghost. Had Hux been trembling any less, Ren would have let go and let him fall onto the durasteel ground.

“Who else would do this but _you_?” Hux says. His heartbeat is fast and rapid, thrumming against Ren’s fingertips.

“Here,” Techie says, holding out a robe. He bears a small smile on his face. The robe is white and fluffy, not something that Ren could picture Hux wearing. But it is a step above the damp white undergarments that currently protect Hux’s dignity.

Hux’s fingers are clumsy and slow. Ren helps Hux rise to his feet, though he sways. Ren helps dress Hux in the robe, tying the belt across his narrow waist. Hux’s toes curl from cold.

“Can you find us any shoes?” Hux asks, smoothing the wrinkles from the robe. He wears it as though it is a uniform, despite how unsteady on his feet he is.

“Yes!” Techie hurries off again and goes to rummage through the cabinets.

“How did you do that?” Ren asks. Take over the body, he wants to say. Come back to him.

Hux shakes his head very slowly. He crosses his arms over his chest. “I don’t know,” he says sharply. The air buzzes around him with his own anxiety. “There was a pull—”

“To the Dark?” Ren asks.

“To the Light. A light.” Hux frowns. “And then I was drowning.”

Realistically, he would not have drowned in a bacta tank, Ren knew. He had plenty of experience with that. But it would not have been pleasant. Not in any way.

Things fall from tables, from their hangings on walls. A datapad falls and shatters.

“What are you doing?” Hux says sharply, turning upon him. His pupils are dilated, mere pinpricks amongst the cold green. He is so very pale, even more pale than that of his old body.

“Hux, you need to breathe,” Ren says. “This isn’t me.”

But this doesn’t help Hux.

Instead whatever blood left drains from his face.

“It cannot be _me_,” Hux says, so very quietly.

Everything goes still.

Hux frowns and then blinks. And blinks again. Tears escape his eyes and trickle down his cheeks.

Ren wipes them away with his thumbs. “Hux,” he says. “You don’t need to cry.”

“No?” Hux says, his voice breaking. “And why not? I thought that everything I achieved came from _me _and my _talent_—not the Force, not my father, not anything else.” And then his face scrunches up and he weeps.

Ren does not know what to do.

He has never seen Hux cry. Has never even imaged Hux _capable_ of crying.

With awkward, unsure hands, he guides Hux close, pressing Hux’s face against his chest. Ren traces nonsense against Hux’s back and sends him feelings of calm, comfort, and reassurance.

“I didn’t want to be anything like you,” Hux says. His words are devoid of the heat and anger Ren would have expected. “And here I am.”

“General Hux, Supreme Leader Ren,” Techie says when he returns, a pair of practical boots dangling from his hands. Techie’s eyes flicker from Hux’s form to Ren’s. “Shall I leave you two alone?” he asks quietly.

“There is no need.” Hux pulls away from Ren and takes the boots from his clone. He puts them on very slowly and then very nearly topples over.

Ren steadies him. “Take your time,” he says.

Hux refuses to look at him as he ties his shoe. A blush has creeped up his his ears. “What will you do now?” he asks scathingly.

Ren pauses.

“You can’t just parade me onto the bridge of the Finalizer,” Hux continues, gathering his wits. “Not when everyone knows that I died.”

“And why not?” Ren demands. “I am Supreme Leader.”

“Yes, yes. Your word is law.” Hux straightens up and rolls his eyes, looking to Techie to search for agreement. “What will they say when we arrive on the Finalizer? That Armitage Hux survived and—_surprise_!—he also has a secret _brother_?”

Techie blushes too at being called someone’s brother. He is elated, even, to be acknowledged as a family member. Ren pushes the clone’s feelings aside. They are not useful in the slightest.

“We’ll say that you didn’t die in the assassination attempt,” Ren says. “We’ll say that you went into hiding while I rooted out the true traitors. Doesn’t this work?”

Hux flares his nostrils. “I must talk to Opan—” He talks a step forwards and crumples. Again, Ren catches him, steadies him, but this time, he refuses to let go of the other man. It’s easy work to lift Hux into his arms, ignoring the other man’s squawking.

“And you will,” Ren promises.

The three of them make their way back to Madrigal’s office. Opan has scarcely moved since they left him, attention fixed firmly on the screen in front of him.

“What have you found?” Ren asks, instead of announcing his presence.

Opan has the sense not to jump in alarm, though he exudes a sharp flash of fear. His mouth falls open and stays open when he sees just who is in Ren’s arms. Opan pulls his hat off of his head. “General Hux!”

Hux sneers in greeting. _I look ridiculous_, he thinks, and he isn’t wrong.

“Or,” Opan trails off, staring at Techie. “Is he another clone?”

Ren snorts. “The body is. The spirit is his own. He’s been plaguing me long enough.”

“How…” Opan shakes his head. “How is that possible?”

“You’ve read the documents, right?” Ren says, growing tired.

“Apparently, I’m Force sensitive,” Hux says, rolling his eyes. He hates this, all of this. Most of all, he hates being held in Ren’s arms. “I was a ghost for a short while.”

“And I suppose you were the thing plaguing our Supreme Leader, sir?” Opan is amused of all things.

Hux snorts. “I had to avenge myself somehow, didn’t I? It seemed as though no one else would.”

“Of course, sir. But—” Opan’s eyes shift to Ren, “—so that I am sure, please tell me something only you would know.”

“I had ordered you to begin gathering information on General Pryde before my unfortunate death,” Hux says casually. “You were to make it embarrassing.”

Opan nods, satisfied. “I don’t want to know the real details of how you returned,” he finally says. “Glad to have you back, General.”

And he means every word he says.

Ren shakes his head. _Opan really thinks they’d come up with a bizarre and complicated lie? Fine. Let him believe._ His shining loyalty to Hux was something extraordinary.

He turns, slowly, to Techie. The clone admired Hux. Had built up a vision of Hux in his mind. There is an easy smile on Techie’s face, his hands clasped together to keep from fidgeting.

Surely, it would be best to kill him now and dispose of the body.

Hux notices and turns to him sharply. He takes a single step in front of Techie. Protective. “Shall we return to the Finalizer, sir?” Hux says, eyes blazing defiance.

Ren nods and turns without a word.

Hux and his two ducklings follow behind shortly.

*

The ride back to the Finalizer is silent. Techie is abuzz with nerves and Opan keeps flicking through the data he had found. Their minds are loud, annoying, cluttered.

And then there is the matter of Hux.

Hux had taken the co-pilot’s seat and almost immediately had fallen asleep, head tipped back. His hair spilled over his face, now only slightly damp from the bacta. It is long, longer than Hux had ever allowed his hair, and unruly.

It would need to be cut and tamed with gel. Ren would miss how it looked now, loose and curled just slightly.

Hux’s mind is quiet. For once, there are no dreams to plague him.

When Ren docks into the ship, he wakes Hux up with a prod in the Force. Hux wakes and sneers at Ren. But Ren does not sneer back. He unclips his cape from his shoulders and drapes it across Hux.

“Wear this,” Ren orders.

And Hux does.

They walk through the halls of the Finalizer. Ren diverts the path of any passing officer and Stormtrooper.

He leads them to his quarters and unceremoniously shuts the door behind them. Millicent trills out her greetings and rushes to Hux’s side.

Hux lets go of Ren’s cloak and stoops to the floor to pick up his cat. He holds her like she is something precious and coos words in an unfamiliar language to her.

Techie cocks his head curiously and stares at Millicent with wide eyes.

Ren ignores all that. He holds out a hand to Opan. “The data,” he says.

Opan unceremoniously hands over the datasticks. “Sir,” he says quietly, so that they might not be overheard, “there may still be a traitor or two left.”

Ren shuts his eyes for a brief, glorious moment and wonders if this headache could have been avoided. (It could have, he knows. But he did not stop to think before killing Hux. And besides, it’s fine; Hux is alive again.)

“We must root them out,” Ren says firmly.

“I’d like the honor of killing them myself.”

Ren looks at Hux. He bears a small smile on his face, hands still full with his purring, pleased cat. He has seen that face before. When someone brought up rumors of Hux killing his father. When Snoke had allowed Hux to execute the man who had sabotaged their ship.

And now, once again.

“You’ll have the honor,” Ren finds himself promising. “So long as I am there to witness it.”

*

Hux asks for Techie’s clothes and, without much hesitation, Techie hands him the ratty yellow shirt and oversized trousers. Techie wears instead a cadet’s uniform, pants slightly too short and revealing his knobby ankles. They may be clones, but they hold themselves so very differently.

Seeing Techie is like catching a glimpse of how Armitage Hux would have grown up to be, had he never escaped the grasp of his father. The shock of it is like a splash of cold water against Ren’s face.

“Do you really think that they will mistake you for the clone?” Ren says instead, disdainfully.

Hux sneers, his lip peeling back from his teeth. “What?” he says. “We’re _clones_. What exactly are you insinuating?”

“Nothing,” Ren says, leaning forward into Hux’s space. “Just that you might look the same, but you act very, very different.”

Hux rolls his eyes and, at his side, Techie hides a little smile, folding and unfolding his hands.

“Sir,” Opan says, handing Hux his own blaster. “Whenever you are ready.”

Hux accepts it graciously, admiring it with a smile of his own. He tucks it away, murmuring thanks to Opan. “Ready, Supreme Leader?” he says, with such disrespect.

Ren snorts. He had never thought he would miss such a thing. “Well then,” he says. “What are you waiting for?”

They walk through the halls as they had as co-commanders, side by side, their shoulders brushing. Hux keeps his head held high, never looking back. Ren hides their approach from passing officers, from droids, from the security monitors overhead.

Hux knows where he is going, violence blooming around him. The Dark is strong with him, whirling about him.

After all of this is taken care of, Ren knows, Hux will need a Master. He will need to be shown the ways of the Force.

And Ren is more than willing to do so.

“Here,” Hux says, coming to a halt before a conference room. “You’ll open the door and head in first.” The suggestion rolls off of his words so easily, but Ren has been trained to resist such a thing.

“And why should I?” Ren murmurs, looming over him. “Careful Hux, one of us is the Supreme Leader.” He fingers the hilt to his lightsaber, crooked against his hip.

Hux doesn’t back away. His eyes never waver, trained on Ren. “You’ll go in first,” he repeats, unabashed. “We have quite the performance ahead of us.”

Ren’s hand falls away from his lightsaber. A show? He snorts. “I hope it amuses me.”

Hux lets out a short, toneless hum.

Ren slides the door and strides in, Hux following shortly behind him. This Hux hunches his shoulders and lowers his chin, until he looks solely at his shuffling feet.

It’s a complete transformation.

Captain Peavey scrambles to his feet from where he’d been sitting, feet up upon the conference table. He salutes sharply. “Supreme Leader, sir,” he says, more than a little panicked. His eyes fall upon Hux’s form. “Wh-what is the meaning of this? Have you cloned General Hux?” His voice is but a whisper, scarcely betraying the alarm and horror that rises from him.

Hux looks up, the lights overhead casting deep shadows across his face. He pulls his blaster and aims it at Peavey. “What did you think you would gain with me gone?” he asks.

Peavey’s mouth drops open and, apparently, he is in no rush to close it. “You died,” Peavey says hollowly.

“And I have returned.” Hux shoots the leg out from under Peavey and watches coldly as Peavey crawls along the floor.

“Please,” Peavey says, desperate. “They promised— they promised me my own ship. A governorship. A wife.”

Everything that Peavey wanted. Dashed, upon the ground.

“The High Command is dead,” Hux says. “All your allies are dead. You are alone.” He points his blaster at Peavey’s head, ignoring the tears streaming down his cheeks, his blubbering cries.

“Have mercy,” Peavey croaks, turning his gaze upon Ren. “I just want what’s best for the Order. You know this, right Supreme Leader?” He smiles, but it looks ghastly upon his face.

Ren watches on. Peavey is loyal to no one but himself and his idealized memories of an Empire long gone.

“Supreme Leader!” Peavey cries out, face red. “You can’t trust him! He killed his own father!”

“I know,” Ren replies cooly. “And I killed my own.”

Peavey goes still, tears renewed at once. He crawls away, but not fast, never fast enough.

Hux fires one last shot before Peavey goes still. Hux puts away his borrowed blaster and reaches for the com secured on Ren’s belt. He requests a cleaning droid and washes his hands of the matter.

There is a fierce smile upon his face. He is wicked, he is terrible.

Ren has never been so attracted to another person in his life. He forces that thought away, and ushers Hux from the mess.

*

Logically, he cannot hide Hux away forever.

But he sequesters Hux away in his quarters for several cycles after Peavey’s death. Ren summons a service droid and a tailor droid and watches as they take care of Hux.

One trims Hux’s hair back to regulation length while the other takes his—and by default, Techie’s—measurements.

Ren had falsified information about Techie with the help of a frightened, nervous Mitaka, awarding the clone with his own identity chip, quarters, and steady employment. Techie received a uniform of his own, one of many identical ones technicians around the Finalizer wore from cycle to cycle.

Hux needs something greater.

Something to show his rank.

“How do you feel about white?” the service droid chirps. It offers up options, ornamentations to add to Hux’s new uniform.

“What is wrong with my old uniform?” Hux asks. “I’m coming back from hiding, to their knowledge, not the dead.” He has enough energy to cast a glare Ren’s way. The things upon Ren’s shelves rattle. A mug throws itself from the edge of a table, saved only by Ren’s quick hand.

“Because,” Ren drawls out, setting the mug down. “You’re returning with a promotion, for allowing me to tarnish your reputation for a time.”

Hux huffs. “Long overdue then.” But he radiates contentment, thick and heady. Ren could get drunk on it.

He answers each question the tailor droid poses easily. As if he had thought about the uniform he would wear as Grand Marshall.

“Thank you, sir,” the tailor droid says before dismissing itself, the service droid trailing at its heels, leaving Ren alone with Hux.

Hux meets his eyes, his gaze never wavering. “Now what?”

*

There is a love for dramatics found somewhere within the blood of every Skywalker, as loathe Ren is to admit it. And so, he does not bring up Hux’s triumphant return until the fine Grand Marshall’s uniform is delivered to them and Hux preens at every angle of his reflection in the mirror.

He looks good, devastatingly so, in the white tunic and jodhpurs. Golden chains trickle along his collar, across his spine, keeping the vivid, red cloak draped across his shoulders. Hux’s eyes meet Ren’s own in the mirror, and his lips twist into a smile.

“See something you like?” Hux drawls out, haughtily. He’s much like his cat, ever proud, eyes narrowed in amusement.

(Millicent, earlier, had seen the golden chains and had taken them for a silly sort of toy for her. She had been indulged, surprisingly, by Hux. Ren cannot stop thinking of the small, genuine smile reserved for Millicent, how Hux’s eyes had crinkled at their corners.)

“I do,” Ren says, staring unabashedly.

This uniform had less padding than the last. Ren is sure he could fit his hands across the width of Hux’s waist.

Hux’s brows leap up, incredulously, and his smile grows over his face.

_Kriff._ Ren had forgotten an essential thing: Hux, too, is Force-sensitive.

“Why did you never bring it up, Supreme Leader?” Hux purrs into Ren’s ear, placing a hand across his chest.

But no— He cannot.

Ren takes Hux’s hands into his own, feels them tremble. “I will not hurt you,” Ren promises. “I will not let anyone ever hurt you again.”

There is something between them. Something young, something in need of nurturing. A bond that kept Hux’s spirit bound to Ren when he no longer had a body to call home. That had been the only thing keeping Hux from oblivion, from true death.

Something that could so easily capture him with its gravity.

Hux looks at him strangely, buoyed in Ren’s grief, regret, anger. His eyes look almost golden in the light. “I am still alive,” he says. “And, should I die, I promise to haunt you again.”

It is as good as a confession for the two of them.

Ren is not sure who steps forward first, but soon they are kissing, great open-mouthed kisses. Hux tastes of bitter tarine tea and Ren chases after him. Hux cradles the back of Ren’s head with both hands, fingers digging into Ren’s hair and tugging at the roots.

He hadn’t thought they would get to do _this _again. Not after everything. Not after misery after misery.

Ren lavishes in the simple warmth of Hux in his arms, solid, and very much alive. He, too, is aware of the monomolecular knife hidden within Hux’s sleeve.

After all, he had helped to select the material the sheath is made of.

They are so rudely interrupted by a chime at the door.

Ren pulls away with the beginnings of a growl. His saber hangs heavily at his hip, suddenly tempting. Hux shushes him, pressing his fingers to Ren’s lips before turning away.

Hux answers the door, running his fingers through his mused hair. It does nothing to hide his kiss swollen lips. “Mitaka,” Hux says in greeting.

The lieutenant is abuzz with emotions. Joyous to see Hux again, suspicious of Ren’s explanation, holding onto the reassurances that Opan of all people had provided. “Grand Marshall, Supreme Leader,” Mitaka says. “Are you ready, sirs?”

Ren brushes past him. He guides them to the holochamber, suggesting that all the nearby officers and Stormtroopers avoid his path.

The media droid flickers to life and lifts into the air, focused on Supreme Leader Ren and Grand Marshall Hux, standing shoulder to shoulder, fierce and united.

How could the galaxy stand a chance?

*

*

*


End file.
